All eyes on Oro’s 13-yr-old chesser Canino in National Women’s Open

INTERNATIONAL Master Daniel Quizon of Dasmariñas City, Cavite just won the 2021 Philippine Open Chess Championship as the youngest participant at 17.

Now, it’s time for Cagayan de Oro City pride Ruelle ‘Tawing’ Canino to show what a 13-year-old can do in the 2021 National Women’s Championship which goes in full throttle today, December 18 at the PACE building in Quezon City.

The country’s winningest age-group campaigner with over a dozen gold medals to show from the international competition fell short of winning the distaff’s national juniors where she placed runner-up behind fellow Woman National Master Mhage Gerriahlou Sebastian whom she managed to defeat.

“She may be the youngest but she can pull off a surprise. Our training was meant to deal with older rivals,” said Canino’s coach and trainer Jaime Joshua Frias II.

The 24-year-old Janelle Mae Frayna, the country’s only Woman Grandmaster, spearheads the 12-player field in this round-robin affair, staking a total of P135,000 cash prizes plus a slot in the Hanoi Southeast Asian Games next year.

Frayna finished 10th place in the National Open held recently in Mactan, Cebu which saw the emergence of the new Philippine Chess king in the young and promising Quizon.

Also expected to give Frayna stiff challenges are former national titlists Shania Mae Mendoza and Jan Jodilyn Fronda, Olympiad veteran Bernadette Galas, and WGM candidate Kylen Joy Mordido.

The Fide-rated 11-round tourney organized by the National Chess Federation of the Philippines also features Marie Antoinette San Diego, Rinoa Mariel Sadey, Marian Calimbo, Ruelle Canino, Allaney Jia Doroy, Lexie Grace Hernandez, and Francois Marie Magpily.